by Diana Palmer
Suddenly Holliman yelled, surprising Jake Marsh. The old man had snuck into the barn. He had his shotgun.
Brannon drew his pistol. And with such deadly speed, and accuracy, that Marsh crumpled and went down before he even could squeeze the trigger of his own gun. The old man had given the Texas Ranger a split-second edge. In the silence that followed, Josie’s gasp was audible.
Brannon went straight toward Marsh without looking anywhere else except at his fallen adversary, unflinching, unyielding, without a second’s hesitation. He bent over and jerked up Marsh’s pistol while Marsh was holding his thigh and trying to stop the blood flowing from it.
“How did you…do that?” Marsh choked, still disbelieving what he’d seen.
“I hold the record for the quick-draw in southern Texas,” Brannon told the groaning man calmly. “I’ve never been beaten in competition.” He gave the other man a cold stare. “Good thing, under the circumstances.”
“You shot Jake,” Silvia said calmly. Her eyes seemed to be glazed. “I shot Dale, you know. He was blackmailing me with those photos, but just a couple of weeks ago he called me and said he was willing to give them back, and the ledger, if I’d get him some money right away so he could help his mother.”
“Oh, God, will you stop talking and get an ambulance?” Marsh groaned.
Brannon reached into his pocket for his flip phone and made the call. Then he noticed Holliman watching Silvia with fury in his eyes.
The old man moved to where Silvia was standing and he lifted his shotgun. “By the time they get here, they’ll need two ambulances!” His voice quivered with emotion.
“Don’t make me shoot you,” Brannon told Holliman, dropping his hand to the butt of his pistol for the second time in less than five minutes. He crouched slightly, and his silver eyes glittered.
Holliman hesitated, but only for a second. He glared at Brannon, but he lowered the barrel of the shotgun with a resigned sigh. “All right, but it was tempting.” He eyed Brannon. “Don’t he remind you of a rattlesnake about to strike?” he asked nobody in particular. Holliman looked down at Marsh and up at Silvia, who was smiling and just staring into space. “What’s the matter with her?” he asked.
“She’s crazy, that’s what’s…wrong with her,” Marsh groaned. “I’m sorry I ever met her!”
“That’s no way to talk about the love of your life,” Silvia said with a sigh. “And after all I’ve done for you, too.”
“You’ve got me shot and I’ll probably go to prison, thanks to you!”
“Losing a lot of blood, ain’t he?” Holliman said with no particular emotion.
“Looks that way,” Brannon said carelessly.
“One of you could put a tourniquet on him, for God’s sake,” Josie said irritably, glaring at them as she bent beside Marsh. “I need a stick and a handkerchief.”
“You’ve got class, lady,” Marsh bit off.
“Don’t you touch him,” Silvia burst out wildly. “He belongs to me!”
“I just went back on the market,” Marsh said, wincing as Josie used two handkerchiefs that Brannon tied together for her, and a ballpoint pen, to make a tourniquet around his upper thigh. She tightened it until the bleeding slowed.
“I wouldn’t do much of that, Miss Langley,” Holliman said.
She glanced up. “Why not?”
“He might live,” he said coldly, glaring at the downed man.
Brannon chuckled. “If he dies, you’ll miss his trial,” he pointed out. “And it’s going to be a humdinger.”
“Hadn’t thought of that.” Holliman brightened. “In that case, I’ll go phone 911 again, just to make sure…oh. There they come.”
The sirens were barely audible when the ambulance roared up in the yard, along with a Bexar County sheriff’s car. Odd, Josie thought, because Floresville was just over the border of Bexar County into Wilson County.
A young deputy got out and came into the barn behind the EMTs who went immediately to work on Marsh. Josie and Brannon recognized him as the deputy they’d seen at Mrs. Jennings’s apartment after her death.
“Hi, Brannon,” he called. “Sheriff’s department over here in Wilson is swamped, so I volunteered to take the call for them. Interagency cooperation,” he added with a grin. “What’s going on?”
“Officer, arrest those people,” Silvia said firmly. “I am the wife of the lieutenant governor. These people—” she indicated Brannon and Josie “—have my property and I want you to take it away from them right now!”
The deputy glanced toward the tall man with the silver star on his pocket and the pistol on his hip. He noticed the automatic weapon stuck in Brannon’s belt and Jake Marsh’s wound. He pursed his lips.
“Been shooting it out again, huh, Brannon?” he mused.
“How did you know that?” Josie wanted to know.
“Oh, we get at least one idiot a year who thinks he can fire before Brannon can draw that hog-legged cannon he wears,” he murmured. “Nice to work in the same city as a real live walking legend, sir. I hope to be just like you when I grow up.”
Brannon burst out laughing, because the deputy had to be thirty if he was a day. “Don’t get ambitious. I’m not resigning so you can get my job.”
“Saw right through me,” the deputy replied, shaking his head. “There’s about a hundred applicants for every Ranger job that opens up, and only about a hundred and seven working Rangers in the whole state of Texas.” He sighed audibly. “Oh, well, I can spend my life working as a deputy, I reckon. Great hours, wonderful company—” he glanced at Marsh and grimaced “—and nice benefits if I live to collect any.” He glanced at Silvia. “Want me to take this lady in for you?”
“Yes, thanks. I’ll come along right behind you with the evidence.” He held up the plastic bag. “You’re about to see an evil empire fall on a ledger,” he added, glancing down at the wounded man, who was being loaded onto a gurney. “Jake Marsh, former mob chief, and very elusive just lately. He’ll look good in striped pants.”
“I won’t…go to prison!” Marsh raged.
“Nor will I,” Silvia said haughtily.
“Come along, lady. You can tell it to the judge,” the deputy said.
“I’ll have you prosecuted!” she shrieked.
“I’ll wear my best dress, too,” he added as he led her to his patrol car and put her carefully in the back seat.
Brannon laughed grimly. Josie was about to say something, but he stopped her. “We don’t want to stunt his emotional growth,” he cautioned. “He’ll find out who she is soon enough.”
Josie slid her hand into his and held on tight. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she said huskily. “I thought you were going to commit suicide for a few seconds there.” She was still shivering a little with reaction, even now.
He slid an arm around her. “You can’t kill a Texas Ranger unless you put a stake through his heart.”
“That’s vampires, sweetheart,” she reminded him.
His eyebrows went up. “You’re kidding!”
“Will somebody get me the hell…out of here?” Jake Marsh groaned.
“Make sure he goes straight to the prison ward when you get him to the medical center,” Brannon told the ambulance men firmly. “I’ll radio ahead and have a man waiting at the emergency room door.”
The ambulance EMTs, both very young, nodded. “He’s not in any condition to cause much trouble,” one of them said with a grin.
“If he tries to, point him toward Floresville and shove him out the back door,” Brannon told them.
Marsh groaned louder.
It took the rest of the day to write up the report, turn in the evidence and talk to the assistant district attorney who was going to be handling the case. Grier sat in with the small group in the meeting room.
“If that isn’t the damnedest story I’ve ever heard,” Grier said, just shaking his head. “We’ve been after Marsh for years with no success whatsoever. The FBI has been after him for years. T
he state attorney general’s been after him for years. And you two just waltz in and put him away!”
“We got lucky,” Brannon said easily.
“What about the hit man, York?” Josie asked worriedly. “He’s still on the loose, isn’t he?”
Grier glanced at the young Bexar County sheriff’s deputy who’d been out at the Holliman place. He was now occupying a chair in the office with Brannon and the others, since he’d been involved in the arrest.
The deputy leaned back in his chair with a wicked grin. “No need to worry about York,” he murmured. “I was driving down the 410 Loop, minding my own business, when this beat-up old car went by me like I was backing up. Even though it was my lunch hour, I chased it down and stopped it. And lo and behold, there was York himself with a dirty bandage on his bullet wound.” He pursed his lips and smiled. “He’s sitting down at the county jail even as we speak. And if Marsh sings like I expect him to, we’ll have York just where we want him.”
“But he didn’t kill anybody,” Josie pointed out. “Silvia killed Garner and Jennings.”
“Yes, but Marsh hired York to kill a man and to try to run down Judd Dunn two months ago when he started investigating the murders that Marsh was suspected in.” He grinned slowly. “Dunn has worked day and night to get enough evidence to put him away for good. He’s the one who told me about the make and model of York’s car. I’ve been looking for it for the past week. York is just going to love prison,” he added with a sigh. “And the men on the inside will certainly love a young, sweet-faced handsome young fellow like him, don’t you think?”
Brannon decided that he wouldn’t answer that, but he grinned back.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The worst part of the ordeal was having to tell Bib Webb what they’d found, and what his wife had done. Brannon took Josie with him, but he phoned Becky Wilson before he left San Antonio and had her come as well.
Bib looked as if he’d been shot. He walked out onto the patio near the swimming pool and stood, with his hands in his pockets, just staring into space.
“Let me have a minute with him first,” Brannon told Becky, who was obviously aching to go to the man on the patio.
“All right.” Becky sat back down with a sigh and smiled shyly at Josie. “Won’t you have a mint?” she offered, and then looked surprised when Josie laughed. Those mints had helped solve a murder.
Bib heard Brannon come up beside him and grimaced. “‘There are none so blind…’” he quoted. He glanced at his best friend. “Did you suspect her?”
“No” came the flat reply. “My money was on the computer hacker. Then we found out that Marsh’s new ‘friend’ was married, and she liked expensive mints.”
Bib took his left hand out of his pocket and studied his wedding band. “I’ve been a bachelor since Silvia was about seventeen,” he murmured. “She liked sex at first, but I wasn’t rough enough to suit her, or reckless enough. She started having ‘friends.’ I started drinking. It wasn’t much of a life. But people get comfortable walking in familiar ruts, and they just keep walking out of habit.”
“This trial is going to be very messy,” Brannon said after a minute. “I wouldn’t bet five cents on your chances for the senate seat when it’s over, and that’s God’s truth.”
“I don’t care.” Bib turned to him. “It doesn’t matter if I lose the lieutenant governor’s spot. I have a company I love, good employees, and we’re branching out into experimental projects that will benefit millions of hungry people in third world countries if we can perfect them. What’s that compared to a political job?”
“That sounds like you.”
Bib smiled. “That is me. All this—” he waved his hand at the opulent living room inside, with its imported crystal and fabric “—is Silvia.” He shrugged. “There’s nobody I want to get even with. Except maybe Marsh.”
“Marsh will serve time, no matter how many good lawyers he can afford. Sadly, so will Silvia, if they don’t find her insane. And they might,” he added quietly. “You have to be prepared for that. She made a pretty shocking confession about her past. I have to tell what I heard.”
“What did she confess?” Bib asked, aghast.
“There’s time for that later,” he said. No reason he couldn’t give the man a few more hours of peace before the media exploded into his life.
Bib worried his hair again. “Well, I’ll phone our attorney and see if he can do anything for Silvia. Maybe he can get a psychiatric profile and have her declared insane. There have been signs for a long time. I’ve been in denial, and pretended I didn’t see them. But,” he added on a heavy sigh, “it’s no use pretending anymore.”
“I’ll do whatever I can to help.”
Bib smiled at him. “I know that. I appreciate it. You’re the only friend I ever had who was willing to believe I wasn’t guilty of any sort of graft.”
“I know you,” Brannon pointed out. “And I don’t desert my friends. Ever. Let Becky come out and talk to you. She’ll save you from the media.”
“Yes, she will,” he said calmly, and with a smile. “I’m going to marry her, when all this is finally over.”
“That doesn’t come as a surprise. She’ll be good for you, too.”
Brannon went back in and spoke briefly to Becky before he sent her out to Bib.
“What do we do now?” Josie asked Brannon, because she felt adrift.
He pursed his lips and smiled slowly. “We have supper, of course. Then we start making plans.”
She wondered about that last remark, but she kept it to herself until they’d had a nice, quiet supper and they were sitting in his SUV in the parking lot of her hotel.
“That looked like Grier’s car,” he remarked as he cut off the engine. “Why would he be here?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him today.” She studied him openly. “You said earlier that we’d make plans. What sort of plans?”
Brannon smiled and touched her mouth gently. “You had surgery just for me. I think that deserves a reward.”
Her face began to redden. “If you mean we’ll go to bed together…”
He grinned. “Why, you shameless hussy,” he teased. “See this?” He pointed at the star on his chest. “I took a vow of chastity. I don’t mess around with women,” he added haughtily.
“Oh, everybody who knows you would believe that, I’m sure,” Josette said with a wry look.
“I don’t mess around with women who aren’t named Josette,” he qualified lazily. “Furthermore, I expect to be an exemplary husband and father.”
She just looked at him. Her eyes were wide, steady and uncertain.
The smile faded. He took her hand in his and lifted the knuckles softly to his mouth. “I love you,” he said quietly. “I never stopped. I’m tired of trying to live without you.”
She still stared, mesmerized.
“I’m in a dangerous profession, but I won’t take unnecessary chances. I can work out of the Victoria office and commute. We’ll have the ranch and both our salaries, and we know the best and worst of each other. We’ll make it. I know we will.”
Josette drew in a long, slow breath, searching his pale eyes. “It’s rather sudden,” she began.
“I know that. I wasn’t suggesting that we jump into bed together tonight and get married in the morning,” he said. He looked very somber. “I want you to resign your job and spend three weeks with me at the ranch.” He held up a hand. “My wrangler and his wife still live in. We’ll have built-in chaperones. You can talk to our local district attorney in Jacobsville about a job, I expect he’d be happy to have the help. I’ll get transferred down to the Victoria office. I’ve already checked, and there’s a man who wants to be closer to his parents in San Antonio. He is more than willing to trade jobs.”
She just shook her head. “You’ve given this a lot of thought,” she said.
“I’ve done nothing else since you came to San Antonio to work on this case.” Brannon searched her eye
s. “It all hinges on whether or not you can forgive me for the past. I know it’s a lot to ask. I’ve made mistakes. Bad mistakes.”
She reached up and touched his firm mouth. “We both did. I should have been willing to talk to you when you called me later that last night we were together. I should have called you back and explained what I felt. After the trial, I should have at least tried to talk to you.”
“That works both ways,” he said curtly. “I didn’t even give you a chance. I just left town.”
“But now I know why you left,” she said. She smiled as his lips pursed against her fingertips. “I’ve been lost without you,” she began, and got choked up.
His arms reached for her. He held her bruisingly close and kissed her so fiercely that it hurt. After a few seconds, his mouth slid against her neck and he held her even closer, a faint tremor in the powerful arms holding her.
“Marc!” she exclaimed, shocked by the way he reacted to her soft confession.
His fingers bit into her back. “I…hated myself,” Brannon whispered hoarsely. “I couldn’t live with hurting you.” His breath sighed out harshly at her ear. “Oh God, I love you—love you with all I am, all I ever will be! When they lay me down in the dark, the last word I whisper will be your name…!”
Josette kissed him hungrily, stopping the words, stopping the pain. She held on for all she was worth, telling him with her lips that she would never leave him, never stop loving him. Tears poured from her eyes, hot and wet on her cheeks, and still she couldn’t let go.
Neither of them noticed that the windows had all fogged up as emotions flared between them. At least, not until there was a firm, and very insistent, knock on the driver’s window.
Brannon, half dazed, let Josette move discreetly out of his arms before he lowered the window.
Grier was leaning down with a theatrical disgusted look on his face. “I never thought I’d see the day that a Texas Ranger would get caught making out in a parked car in front of a really nice hotel.”
“Well, where else could we go?” Brannon demanded, fierce-eyed. “I can’t take her back to my apartment and we can’t go up to her hotel room, for obvious reasons! We just got engaged!”